Preview

Cambria Arts are delighted to welcome one of the finest vocal and dance groups to have come out of Africa for tonight’s show. We are doubly lucky, as they have decided to base themselves for the whole of summer 2003 in West Wales!

Formed in 1991, Imbizo are an eleven-man a´cappella group in the same tradition of Ladysmith Black Mambazo. Their rich singing and precise and energetic dances carry the true celebration of the spirit and culture of their home in Zimbabwe. From Bulawayo, Imbizo have been described as the most talented, professional and charismatic group ever to come out of Zimbabwe. The group has been touring the world regularly since 2000, with appearances at Womad in Spain, Germany, Sicily, Prague, and UK festivals at Sidmouth, Glastonbury, Africa Oye. In 2001, they made their first visit to the USA, where they performed with Peter Gabriel at Womad Seattle.

All 11 guys were at school together in a rural communities in Matebeleland, Zimbabwe and sang together at school and in church. At home in Zimbabwe they all live near to each other and spend their time rehearsing and performing. The group also hosts their own festival in November at Entumbane, Bulawayo.

On tour they continue to delight festival and theatre audiences, and we’re looking forward to one of the most colourful and evocative shows of the year.

‘It was breathtaking and the crowds begged for more......’ - Sandy Francis, Glastonbury 2002

Review

Making cultural connections - it's got to be one of the main criteria for presenting (what's loosely called) world music, and the magnificent 10-piece Imbizo fulfilled that requirement like no other act we've hosted. From the moment we discovered that these majestically gifted Zimbabweans were temporarily exiled in Llanon (of all places!) the arrangements fell into place and the spell was cast.

Friday afternoon saw eighty enthralled primary schoolchildren crowded into the Talbot's function room for an exclusive workshop that was so much more than just a perfunctory performance - instead, it was supremely interactive, a privileged insight into a culture of dance, rhythm, and music from the other side of the globe. This was a two-way exchange in which the kids were put to the test on their learning capacity: 'Mum, Dad, they taught me how to dance!' reported one ecststic lad, to our knowledge, and he wasn't the only one, as shown by the number of children who returned in the evening, with their parents, eager to buy some of the lovely artefacts fashioned by band members and their compatriots, and to witness the stunning show.

The evening fell into two distinct halves. For part one, Imbizo eschewed amplification, which would have been pretty impractical in any case, given its vivid theatrical format, presenting extravagant traditional dance and narrative song involving numerous changes of line-up and spectacular costume, and testing the structure of our wooden stage extension to its absolute limits. Violent stamping and descending from a great height are major elements in their dances, and structural collapse seemed just a stamp away, but mercifully didn't occur. Instrumentation was minimal, and restricted to a few clay drums and a marvellously primitive 3-stringed banjo-like affair, the body of which had seen previous service as an oil can, and whose bridge was a corn-cob husk. Above all, what hits you is the vocals: a complex pattern of interwoven harmonies, with that exciting distinctive bottom-end reverberation, over which individuals take turns to sing the lead. In part two, each band member had a microphone, and the effect was almost overwhelming in its power. The dances continued unabated, as did the costume changes, ranging from dazzling matched shirts to traditional garb, and wellies and hard-hats, via some very fetching leopardskin boxer-shorts. Boy, do these guys look fit!

Sound, colour, movement, emotion, energy, joy, atmosphere, and a glimpse into another world: Imbizo gave us all these and more in the course of an evening that none of us will forget in a hurry. As we dismantled the stage, and swept up the splinters and sawdust, we reflected that Imbizo's presentation of Zimbabwe's indigenous folk culture was an object lesson in how it should be done, one from which other nations (no names, no packdrill) might profitably learn.